Program Notes

Notes on the program by
John Shepard

Tonight's processional, "Cuncti simus concimentes," was preserved in the manuscript known as the Llibre Vermell (or Red Book) compiled before 1400 at the Benedictine monastery of Montserrat in Spain. Montserrat was also the site of the shrine of the Black Virgin, the frequent destination of pilgrimages. Today, few are aware that worship in the Middle Ages took the form of dance as well as that of song, and such was the case at Montserrat. "Cuncti simus" is thus a virelai, a medieval French verse/song form related to the dance.

The carol shares with the virelai an inspiration in bodily movement, either as dance or as procession. The English carol "My Dancing Day" reinforces this connection with the poetic image of dance as a metaphor for Christ's life, or fate, or faith. Similarly, "my true love" is mankind for whose salvation Christ died. The words and music of this carol were first printed together in 1833 in a collection of carols compiled by William Sandys, but the text can be traced at least as far back as the fifteenth century.

A fifteenth-century manuscript is the source for the carol text "Myn lyking" which Sir Richard Runciman Terry (1865-1938) set to music in 1912. Terry was in the habit of consulting such manuscripts in the course of his role in the revival of English Renaissance choral works as the music director of Westminster Cathedral and as an editor of the monumental series of scores entitled Tudor Church Music. With such a scholarly background, it is remarkable that he should have composed such a simple, tuneful setting as "Myn lyking."

John Tavener (born 1944) is famous in the British Isles as the composer of large-scale choral works which embody his Orthodox faith. Moreover, he is internationally renowned for his 1987 work The Protecting Veil for solo cello and strings. His music often joins elements of modernist techniques such as serialism with traditional tonal or modal melodies and harmonies. "The Lamb" (1982) illustrates this practice in microcosm. Richard Steinitz has written: Tavener's setting of "The Lamb" from [William] Blake's 1789 poems was written for the third birthday of his nephew, Simon. The music came to him in barely more time than it takes to perform, and beautifully conveys the tenderness of divine love expressed through every living thing.

The West Coast composer Morten Lauridsen (born 1943) wrote O magnum mysterium when he was Composer-in-Residence for the Los Angeles Master Chorale, the group which premiered the work in December 1994. In O magnum mysterium (1994), Lauridsen creates an atmosphere of hushed reverence by employing D-major harmonies which, until the conclusion, avoid root-position triads and clear resolution to the tonic. In a device reminiscent of moments of passion in some madrigals by the 17th-century composer Claudio Monteverdi, Lauridsen carefully selects a single dissonant tone (G-sharp, the only pitch in the entire work which does not belong to D-major) to inject a pang of emotion at the words "Beata Virgo."

Anton Bruckner (1824-1896), best known for his ten symphonies of epic scale, nevertheless composed a number of more tightly constructed compositions for the church. Bruckner composed his motet "Ave Maria" early in May 1861, immediately after the completion of his years of counterpoint study with the legendary teacher Simon Sechter. Despite the motet's obvious debt to the tradition of sacred polyphony, "Ave Maria" owed its birth not to the church but to the tradition of secular choral societies which flourished in Germany and Austria (and even in the German immigrant communities of New York City) throughout the 19th century. While organist at Linz Cathedral, Bruckner conducted a Gesangverein which bore the name Liedertafel "Frohsinn" (the "cheerfulness" glee club); that ensemble presented "Ave Maria" to a Linz audience on May 12, 1861. This early masterpiece opens with the pure sound of F-major triads in the women's voices. Men's voices initiate a modulation to the distant bright chord of A-major, with which the entire choir sings the word "Jesus." The full choir concludes the motet with a development of the opening material.

Franz Biebl (1906-2001) was teaching music theory and directing choirs in the Hochschule für Musik in Salzburg, Austria, when he was drafted into the German army in World War II. After his unit was captured in Italy in 1944, he spent the remainder of the war in a POW camp in Michigan. There, he was allowed to organize a choir and he became acquainted with Afro-American spirituals, many of which he later introduced to post-war Germany in his own arrangements for choir. First as a church choir director, and later as the head of choral programming for the Bavarian Radio, Biebl embraced the German tradition of community choirs and intended many of his hundreds of compositions and arrangements for avocational singers. "Ave Maria" (1964) was originally written for the men's chorus of a fire department near Munich. The work was little known for many years, until an American choir which had performed for Bavarian Radio brought it back to the U.S. "Ave Maria" soon achieved phenomenal popularity with choirs here and when a recording by Chanticleer made "Ave Maria" an international hit, Biebl arranged the work for mixed chorus. After an interview with Biebl, Wilbur Skeels wrote that the Latin text comes from two sources: The first source is the thrice-daily devotional exercise called the Angelus in the Catholic Church…. It consists of a thrice-repeated "Hail Mary," each with an introductory versicle based on the Gospel, followed by a concluding versicle and prayer…. In place of the "Ave Maria, Sancta Maria" from the Angelus text, Biebl has substituted the first part of the even more familiar text of the standard "Ave Maria" prayer ("Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum," etc.) and in lieu of the closing versicle and prayer of the "Angelus" he has substituted the second part of the "Ave Maria" ("Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis," etc.), so that the whole is a hybrid of the two ancient texts.

The versicles, actually traditional plainsong melodies, are sung by a small group of male cantors. The newly composed "Ave Maria" statements are sung by a seven-part double choir.

Emile Desamours (born 1941) is a civil engineer, organist, and choirmaster, and one of Haiti's most active composers. He currently serves as musical director for Haiti's premier folk choir, Voix et Harmonie, now in its 22nd year of performing. Desamours has composed and arranged numerous pieces for piano and chorus, often employing elements of Haitian folk music in his works. In "Noèl Ayisyen" ("A Haitian Noël"), sung in Creole, the singers use tongue clicks and imitate the sounds of traditional Haitian instruments, expanding upon traditional choral singing skills.

Susan Gardner's 1979 arrangement of the traditional gospel song "O What a Pretty Little Baby" makes it possible for choirs that learn parts from the printed page to approach the experience of freely singing from memory. Her scoring captures details of performances heard in many predominantly Afro-American churches throughout the U.S., including the inexorable pulsation of the piano part and the improvised flourishes of the soloist.

The Nigerian drummer, composer, and impresario Babatunde Olatunji (born 1927) has introduced generations of North Americans to West African performing traditions, through his ensemble's concert tours, his record albums (starting with Drums of Passion in 1960), and his collaborations with John Coltrane, Max Roach, Yusef Lateef, Freddie Hubbard, Sonny Rollins, Jerry Garcia, and Mickey Hart. Olatunji was educated at the Baptist Academy in Lagos and then came to the U.S. in 1950 to study for a B.A. degree at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia. Olatunji introduced the college's choir director, Wendell Whalum, to the traditional Nigerian Christmas song "Betelehemu" ("Bethlehem"). Whalum prepared the arrangement we sing tonight, leaving opportunities for the percussion interludes integral to the tradition from which Olatunji originated.

Gerald Finzi (1901-1956) composed a body of works deeply connected to the English countryside and the pastoral life he knew as a youth. After Finzi's death, Ursula Vaughan Williams (wife of Ralph Vaughan Williams) recalled time she spent with him during the 1956 Three Choirs Festival: … the Finzis drove us out to Chosen Hill [in Gloucester] and Gerald described how he had been there as a young man on Christmas Eve at a party in the tiny house where the sexton lived and how they had all come out into the frosty midnight and heard bells ringing across Gloucestershire from beside the Severn to the hill villages of the Cotswolds.

The memory of that distant midnight must have been in Finzi's mind when he composed In Terra Pax during the years 1951-1954. Given Finzi's pacifist sympathies, it seems natural that after having lived through the Second World War, he would have chosen for his text Robert Bridges' poem "Noel: Christmas Eve, 1913," written on the verge of the First World War. Finzi achieved dramatic contrast by interpolating the Gospel of St. Luke narrative of the revelation of Christ's birth to the shepherds after the second stanza of Bridges' poem ("Then sped my thoughts to keep that first Christmas of all"). The two texts are differentiated by a simple and elegant device: the baritone and soprano soloists sing Bridges' verses and the choir sings the passages from St. Luke. At the climax of In Terra Pax ("Glory to God in the highest"), the choir itself mimics the pealing of bells such as Finzi heard on that "frosty Christmas Eve."

Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921) wrote his Oratorio de Noël (Christmas Oratorio, op. 12) at age 33, when he was the organist at the church of La Madeleine in Paris. Composition of the oratorio occupied him but twelve days in December 1858, and the work was immediately rehearsed; it premiered at his church on Christmas Day. The Prelude for organ and strings bears the superscription "Dans le style de Séb. Bach" and deliberately recalls the pastorale in J.S. Bach's Christmas Oratorio. The second movement ("Et pastores erant") is a recitative and chorus based on the Latin version of the same passage from St. Luke which Gerald Finzi set in In Terra Pax. The chorus --"Gloria in altissimis Deo"--sets the words from the Vulgate Bible rather than the text ("Gloria in excelsis Deo") familiar from the Mass. The third movement ("Expectans, expectavi Dominum") is an aria in E major for mezzo-soprano, strings, and organ. "Domine, ego credidi" (fourth movement) calls for tenor solo, four-part women's chorus, strings, and organ; the text describes the sending of Christ into the world. The organ doubles as a harp in the ensemble for the lively soprano/baritone duet "Benedictus qui venit" (fifth movement). The sixth movement's chorus ("Quare fremuerunt gentes?") contrasts dramatic declamation with lilting melody ("Gloria Patri"). The seventh movement ("Tecum principium") is a trio for soprano, tenor, and baritone and features contrasting accompaniments in the organ, both arpeggios and sustained harmonies. "Alleluia, laudate coeli" (eighth movement) is a quartet for two sopranos, a baritone, and an alto (who opens and closes the movement). The quintet and chorus "Consurge, Filia Sion" (ninth movement) recalls and develops the themes from the first-movement Prelude. The final movement ("Tollite hostias") is a joyfully festive chorale.